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John Pryke's series of articles was on the Union Freight RR in Boston a few years back in MR (3 parts I think, Sep-Nov '00?). There's also a great book that about the UFRR -- The Railroad That Came Out At Night -- I got my copy at ABE.com. This is the type of layout where you definitely want to go with as tight a radius as you can squeeze a 40' car around. When the UFRR had to deliver any cars over 40', they had to uncouple them before they could use the engine to shove them around the corners! Get some flex track and some 40' cars and experiment. The UFRR also had to do 'wrong-way running' to get into some of their sidings, from the right hand track, the turnout would feed into a diamond across the left hand track and then into a sharp 90 degree curve to fit down the alleyways. The wrong-way running was extra entertaining since this track ran down the length of Atlantic Avenue on Boston's waterfront; and drunks coming out of the bars late at night would meet a train coming at them in the wrong lane of the street. This didn't surprise the 'regulars', but quite a surprise to foreigners. Some folks like to complain of the problem that manufacturers modify engines to take too small a minimum radius. Atlas went the other way with a radius problem with their new N scale shays. The UFRR used 3 truck box-cab shays for a long time. The Atlas N 3 truck Shay can only handle a minimum radius of 9.75" -- way to wide to accurately model the UFRR trackage [:O] A 40' box car can squeeze around a 6" radius in N, so 12" is probably what you're looking for in HO. #4 turnouts are the largest you'd want, smaller if you can find them or make them. #2.5 wyes will help wherever they might work out in your trackplan. Cheers, Maureen
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